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March 26, 2014

more ketchup.

Oh, March, how did you get away from me??

Sorry about that last post... I had made up some little notes that I hoped would jog my memory when I finally sat down to write all about John's trip home for spring break, but it didn't work. I really need to get back in the habit of blogging as things happen.

This girl is getting SO BIG!! Let's not discuss the fact that she's already eight months old, and just focus on her deliciously chubby cheeks.

(Ignore the slobber, please. She's like a fountain of gross sometimes.)

Her cheeks are the best. They're smushy and pink and jiggle when the stroller goes over a bump. Sometimes I steer her over bumpy ground for a lot longer than necessary because it's just so cute to see her cheeks jiggling. The downside of those beautiful cheekies is all the slobber she can store in them. Seriously, you don't wanna be around when we have to break out the bulb-syringe...

It's not only her cheeks that are wonderfully chunky... she's got some pretty serious thigh-rolls, too!!

And homegirl is totally loving this warm weather that means she can go pantsless!! She likes the freedom it gives her to get her foot all the way in her mouth while she's strapped into the carseat.

She LOVES her feet. I haven't gotten a really good picture or video of it yet, but her new favorite thing to do is cry and whine until I've brought her all the toys she owns, and then start chomping on her foot and babbling to herself about how hilarious she is. I really don't know why we buy her toys... she would be fine with a paper towel and her feet (one sock on, one sock off - preferably).

I love celebrating holidays with thig girl. We were all a little funky-sick on St. Patrick's Day, and never left the house, but this was her SUPER cute outfit...

She wore that for her dad the Friday before, and the she wore this while we all lazied around the house on Monday...

And just to even things out, she wore green polka dots and her big St. Patrick's Day bow to the doctor on Tuesday. She had to get two shots, one in each leg, for the flu/RSV. Usually there are two nurses that do the shots at the same time, but this time she had to do one, stick on a bandaid, then do the other one, and stick on another bandaid. Ruthe is not a fan of doing it that way.

In the past couple of weeks she's gone from 16lbs. 9oz. to a full SEVENTEEN pounds!! Most of her doctors keep track of her weight in kilograms, which is super annoying, but they generally do the math for me right after. If they don't, I look it up on my phone really fast so I know how much heavier 7.55 is than 7.1, or whatever it was the last time. Sometimes if the nurses aren't looking I hit the button to switch it over instead, but not all the scales calculate the ounces for you, some just give you a decimal point which is almost worse!! Can you tell that I hate math??

Anyway, we've seen her cardiologist at least twice since the last time I really posted anything on here. He is great!! We love Dr. Rollins! He says that everything looks just how they all expect it to look at this stage.

Her stent is narrowing, because she's growing and it's stretching out, so her pressures will probably start to build up, or drop, or do whatever they do in that situation. (You can tell I pay VERY close attention.) That means her next surgery will be happening pretty soon... in the next month or two. Dr. Rollins really wants to get past flu season before we take her back into the hospital.

Oh! And look!

WE HAVE A THUMB-SUCKER!! Haha. She really doesn't do this very often, but I just love it when she does!

With the cleft palate, and being fed by g-tube, there are a lot of concerns that Ruthe will develop sensory issues with food. But so far, she is doing fabulous!! I realize that she doesn't look very happy in this next picture, but she really does like these MumMum crackers. She still hasn't figured out swallowing, but as long as she doesn't get too big of a chunk in her mouth, the little pieces will just disintegrate. Or she sticks them out on her tongue and I have to retrieve them - depends on her mood.

Right now, and I mean that literally, right this second, as I'm holding Ruthe in one arm and typing with my other hand, she's got a a gnarly cough. So far she doesn't have any other symptoms, so I'm just calling it croup. She is on some breathing treatments, and I have some regular cough-syrup-type medicine on standby. I kind if giggle when I think about giving her cough medicine through her g-tube because in my non-medical opinion, the best and most effective part of cough syrup is that it coats your sore, sick throat in its thick-but-burning-goodness. G-tubes don't offer that option.

She is much more interested in what the nebulizer does now... At least, if you interpret "interested" as "wants to lick everything".

Just look at that sad little pout! She really hates being sick, but she sure is a trooper and suffered through an afternoon of shopping for some summery outfits. We found the CUTEST swimsuit for her. It's maybe the fourth one...

There are plenty more adorable and interesting things I could post tonight... but my hand is starting to cramp from all the typing and scrolling and binky-adjusting.

So I'll leave you with this last picture of Ruthe, playing withe one of her favorite things.

(This was earlier today, and it's the first time she's really torn the paper all apart like that. Ugh, everything she does is just so disgustingly cute!!)